Midyear Check-In: Measuring Impact, Profit, and Pleasure - EP 051

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We're halfway through the year, which makes it the perfect time for a midyear check-in. In this episode, I walk you through a reflection using my Satisfaction Strategy framework to assess where you are and where you’re headed. We look at how impact, profit, and pleasure are showing up in your business, and how small adjustments can lead to big shifts. I also talk about why gratitude and celebration are essential for sustainable growth. Whether this year is unfolding how you imagined or you’re feeling the need for a reset, this episode will help you realign your business goals with your well-being and take intentional steps forward.

Episode Takeaways:

• Mid-year check-ins allow for meaningful adjustments.
• Gratitude and celebration are crucial for sustainable growth.
• Assessing impact, profit, and pleasure is essential.
• Intentional recalibration helps in aligning future goals.
• Small course corrections can lead to significant improvements.
• Pleasure is necessary for long-term business sustainability.
• Establishing monthly check-ins can enhance accountability.
• Focus on one or two primary goals for meaningful progress.
• Building a soul-aligned business is a continuous practice.
• Your well-being should not be sacrificed for success.

Key Insights:

“Today is the perfect time for an intentional mid-year pause. We’re not just looking at the numbers or the metrics. We’re examining impact, profit, and pleasure. How all three of these elements are working together, how they're supporting each other, and where we might need to make some intentional adjustments to create even more alignment and sustainability in the months ahead.”

“You don’t have to choose between making money and making a difference. You don't have to sacrifice your wellbeing for your success. And you don't have to wait until you've made it to experience joy in your work. The satisfaction strategy isn't about achieving some perfect balance. It's about creating an ongoing integration of what matters most to you.”

Resources I Mention:

• Episode 44: Identity Alchemy: Becoming the Person You Need to Be
• Episode 45: Identity Evolution: Lessons from the Masters
• The Prosper Network 

Connect With Me:

• Email: [email protected]
• Instagram: @RachelAnzalone
• Facebook: Rachel.Anzalone
• LinkedIn: RachelAnzalone

Question for Your Reflection:

What are you most proud of from the first half of the year?

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Remember: Your pleasure is your power. 💫

Ready to step into the pleasure revolution and transform how you do business? Let's explore how to maximize impact, profit, and pleasure in alignment with the new paradigm. Schedule a time to connect with me right here >>>

Episode Transcript

“Can you believe that we're already at the midpoint of 2025?

Whether this year has unfolded exactly as you planned or if it's taken some unexpected turns, today is the perfect time for an intentional mid-year pause. We’re not just looking at the numbers or the metrics. We’re examining impact, profit, and pleasure. How all three of these elements are working together, how they're supporting each other, and where we might need to make some intentional adjustments to create even more alignment and sustainability in the months ahead.

I invite you to treat this episode like a working session. So grab a pen and paper. If you do so, by the end of our time together, you'll have a really clear sense of where you are, where you wanna go, and how to make the second half of 2025 your most aligned and satisfying yet.”

Hello and welcome to Pleasure and Profits. I'm your host, Rachel Anzalone, and I'm so glad you're here with me today. Can you believe that we're already at the midpoint of 2025? It feels like it was just a couple of weeks ago that I launched season two of this podcast and we were setting our intentions for the new year, and yet here we are halfway through already.

Whether this year has unfolded exactly as you planned so far, or if it's taken some unexpected turns, or maybe a little bit of both in different areas, today is the perfect time for what I call an intentional mid-year pause.

If you're in the Northern Hemisphere like I am, you're experiencing the full energy of summer right now. In last week's episode about the summer solstice, my good friend, Krissy Shields, and I talked all about this particular moment in time where it is the peak of daylight and there are certain things that are starting to harvest, but there are plenty of things that are still needing to be nourished and nurtured for the coming months, knowing that they won't actually harvest until much later in the summer.

Even with that being the case, now is the time when we get to see the things that we planted in the spring, and tended to, starting to produce for us. It's also the time of year when wise gardeners assess what's thriving and what might need to be pruned or adjusted for the season ahead. The same principle applies beautifully to our businesses.

Today we're going to do a mid-year check-in using the Satisfaction Strategy Framework that we've been exploring all year long. I’m talking about the powerful integration of impact and profit and pleasure that creates the foundation for a soul-aligned and sustainable business.

Here's what makes this process different from your typical business review. We're not just looking at the numbers or the metrics. We’re examining how all three of these elements are working together, how they're supporting each other, and where we might need to make some intentional adjustments to create even more alignment and sustainability in the months ahead.

If it's possible for you to do so, I invite you to treat this episode like a working session. So grab a pen and paper or open up your notes app on your phone because we're gonna move through some powerful reflection questions together. And if you can, take the time to pause and write down your answers. If you can't take the time right now to write down your answers, maybe you can pause for a moment and just reflect or listen to this all the way through and then come back to it later when you do have the time and the space to just to really sit and invest in reflecting and writing down your answers to these questions.

If you do so, by the end of our time together, you'll have a really clear sense of where you are, where you wanna go, and how to make the second half of 2025 your most aligned and satisfying yet. All right, let's dive into it. 

Before we get into the reflection itself, I wanna talk about why mid-year check-ins are so much more powerful than waiting for an annual review. First, six months is the perfect amount of time to have some real data about what's working and what's not. It's also soon enough to make meaningful adjustments that can impact the rest of your year instead of waiting until the very end of the year to see how things shake out. If you wait until December, you've missed the opportunity to course correct along the way. Right now is the perfect time to assess and make choices in order to ensure that when you get to the end of the year, you're creating the results that you set out to create or that you've pivoted to even more aligned or even more sustainable results for yourself.

Second, and this is super important, there is a difference between reactive pivoting and intentional recalibration. Reactive pivoting is what happens when we're constantly changing direction based on the latest thing that we heard or that we learned or because we're panicking about not seeing immediate results. Intentional recalibration, on the other hand, is what we're doing today, taking a thoughtful pause to assess what's working, what isn't, and what adjustments would serve our highest good.

This process ties beautifully into the seasonal rhythms that we've been talking about throughout the year. Summer, as I said, is naturally a time of discernment, of making choices about what to invest in, and of the early harvest, and ensuring that we're putting the work into the things that we want to be able to harvest when they're ready later on in the season.

In the business world, it's when we get to see the beginnings of the fruiting of the seeds that we planted in the spring. And it's when we get to make decisions about what to cultivate more of and what to release or transform.

In my experience, I see two common mistakes that people make at the mid-year point. The first is giving up too early. Maybe you set some ambitious goals in January, and by June, you're not seeing the results that you had hoped for. So you decide that those goals were unrealistic, and you just abandon them entirely. The second mistake is pushing ahead blindly. Maybe you're so committed to your original plan that you refuse to acknowledge what's not working and you just keep grinding away, even when your energy, your joy, or your bank account is telling you that something needs to shift. 

Today, we're going to find the sweet spot between these two extremes. Honoring what we’ve learned while staying committed to our deeper vision and values.

Alright, so let's get started with some reflection. And I'm going to begin with my favorite place to start any assessment, which is gratitude and celebration. Take a moment right now and ask yourself, what are you genuinely grateful for from the first half of 2025? I invite you to think beyond business wins. Maybe you're grateful for a difficult conversation that you had that deepened a relationship. Maybe you're grateful for a boundary that you held that preserved your energy. Maybe you're grateful for the resilience you discovered during a challenging period of time or for the way that what seems like a setback led you to an even better opportunity. If you're able to, now is a great time to press pause, do a little reflection, do a little writing. If you’re not able to write right now, just  take a moment to pause and think about this. What are you grateful for right now? 

Next, consider what are you proud of accomplishing? Again, think holistically. What did you create or complete or contribute that feels really meaningful to you? This might be launching something new or it might be the consistency with which you showed up for existing clients. It might be a financial milestone. It might be the way you handle the difficult situation with grace. It could be something that you stopped doing so that you could create space to invest in your own well-being or quality time with family or friends. Again, I invite you to pause now, reflect on this if you can, if you're able to, write some notes.

I cannot overstate how important this practice of gratitude and celebration is for sustainable growth. In our achievement-oriented culture, we're trained to immediately move on to the next goal without acknowledging what we've already accomplished. And that just sets us up to be constantly chasing something and never ever feeling like we've arrived.

And if you're a driven person, if you are a high performer, if you're highly motivated, if you are creative, then I have no doubt that as soon as you finish one goal, there are probably five or 10 more waiting in the wings that you're excited to get started on. 

But celebration isn't just about feeling good for a moment. It's not superficial fluff. It's actually neurologically essential for building confidence and momentum. The more you acknowledge and celebrate your successes, the more motivated and inspired you are to keep going take the actions that are gonna help you to create the impact that you ultimately wanna have in the world.

When we take the time to acknowledge our wins, our brain creates positive neural pathways that make future successes more likely. So please give yourself a moment to really feel proud of what you've created and accomplished for these first six months of the year. Maybe even placing your hands on your heart, closing your eyes for a moment. Of course, not if you're driving or walking and just really feeling that gratitude and appreciation in your body.

Now that you've celebrated and appreciated what you have created and accomplished in these first six months, let's now move into assessment. We're gonna look at this through the lens of our three essential elements, impact, profit, and pleasure. Let's start with impact. Who have you directly impacted in the first half of the year? Think about your clients, your customers, your team, your community. What feedback have you received from them? What transformations have you witnessed? 

Also consider the ripple effects. What indirect impacts are you seeing from your work? Maybe a client implemented something that they learned from you and saw amazing results with their own clients or within their own team or with their own customers. Maybe a social media post that you shared was exactly what someone needed to hear at the absolute perfect moment. 

And here's a crucial question. Are you creating the kind of change you intended to when you started this year? If there's a gap between what you hope to create and what you're actually creating, I invite you to consider that that's not a failure, it's valuable information for the choices you're going to make going forward.

Now let's look at profit. Where are you financially compared to where you plan to be at this point in the year? And I invite you to answer this without judgment. We're just gathering data here. It's all just information for decision making in the future. Think about which revenue streams are working well for you. Which ones aren't performing as expected. What patterns do you notice about when money flows easily and when it feels more challenging?

And here's a really good question that I don't hear asked enough. How sustainable does your current profit model feel? Are you making money in a way that energizes you? Or are you making money in a way that's depleting your resources? Whether that is your time or your energy or your joy, your motivation. Again, all of this is just information gathering for future decisions.

Finally, let's examine pleasure. What aspects of your business are genuinely bringing you joy right now? Where do you find yourself in flow, losing track of time because you're so engaged in what you're doing?

On the flip side, where are you experiencing energy leaks? These are the activities or the relationships or the commitments that consistently drain your energy rather than replenish it. And perhaps most importantly, how sustainable is your current pace and approach? When you think about maintaining your current way of working for the next six months, does that feel exciting and doable or does it feel overwhelming?

Based on everything that you just reflected on, I invite you to quickly identify what it is that you want more of in the second half of 2025 and what you want less of. More of might include more collaborative projects, more speaking opportunities, more time in nature while working, more premium clients, more consistent revenue, more creative expression in your work. Less of might include less time on social media, fewer projects that don't align with your core mission, less overwhelm, fewer energy-draining relationships, less time spent on administrative tasks perhaps. 

If you're able to write these down right now, go ahead and do that. Otherwise, come back to this place, listen again, and make sure that you take the time to reflect and write down your answers when you’re in a place and in the space to do so. These answers are going to inform your forward planning for the rest of this year, perhaps even beyond that.

Now that we've done some honest reflection, let's look ahead. This is where we move from assessment into intentional recalibration. First, let's revisit your intentions from the beginning of the year. What did you hope to create in 2025? What were your primary goals or focus areas? Looking at where you are now, what's working better than you expected? What deserves more of your attention and energy because it's proving to be aligned and effective? What needs to be adjusted, paused, or perhaps even released entirely?

This is where we get to practice that strategic pivoting that I mentioned rather than reactive abandonment. Maybe a goal you set in January no longer serves your vision or maybe you learned something about yourself or your market that suggests that a different approach would be more effective. Maybe something else just got more traction and is flying ahead with very little effort. And that initial goal needs to just sit and wait until this other thing is accomplished or created or completed. And then you can come back to it.

The key here is using your discernment. Are you considering a change because you're avoiding discomfort that's actually part of growth or because you genuinely learned something that suggests a different path would be more aligned for you? I like to think about it this way. Strategic pivoting serves your long-term vision and values. Shiny object syndrome serves your desire to avoid the natural challenges of building something meaningful.

For the remainder of 2025, I invite you to identify one or maybe two primary focus areas, three at the absolute maximum. These should be areas where you can create meaningful progress without overwhelming yourself. As you consider these focus areas, make sure they create synergy across impact, profit, and pleasure. Ask yourself, how will this focus area allow me to create meaningful impact? How will it contribute to sustainability and profitability? How will it honor my need for joy and satisfaction in my work? Remember that these areas are synergistic. They support each other, they feed each other, and they allow for each other to flourish. 

If a potential focus area only serves one of these elements while undermining the others, it's probably not the right choice for sustainable growth. Or if you do choose to go down that path, you have to be mindful that you're making a choice, maybe a short term adjustment that focuses more energy on one area than another. And give yourself timeline, so that you know when you’ve reached a reasonable limit to have pulled resources from one area towards another.

Now, let's talk about this in terms of seasonal rhythms. As we've been talking about the winter season and then the spring, and now here we are moving into the summer, it's really what we're considering an implementation season. Q3 is a great time to take action on what we've planned and planted earlier in the year. Q4, you'll see as we move into later fall and into winter, becomes more about integration and completion and rest.

So for Q3 you might focus on cultivating, nourishing, helping to grow something that you are implementing or launching or scaling, something that's been in development since perhaps even the winter or the spring. For Q4, you may be focused more on fulfillment, on completing projects or seeing them through to the end, integrating the lessons that are learned and preparing for the new year to come.

I also want to introduce you to what's often called the Be-Do-Have model for implementation. Instead of just asking what you want to accomplish, ask yourself, who do I need to be to achieve this goal? What qualities, mindset, or ways of showing up support this intention? What do I need to do consistently to make this happen? What are the key activities or habits that will move me forward? And what will I have as a result, not just tangibly, but what experience will I have created for myself and for others?

If you want a more in-depth look at this process, this philosophy, I suggest you check out episodes 44 and 45 where I spoke in-depth about identity engineering, identity alchemy, who some of the thought leaders are in this area, and how to apply this into your own circumstances.

But even with this small introduction, this framework will help ensure that your goals aren't just about external achievement, but about becoming a person who naturally creates the results that you want, focusing on being that person first who accomplishes the goal, and then doing what that person would do in order to get to that goal, and then really focusing on what will come as a result of that effort and that transformation that you undergo in the process.

Okay, finally, let's talk about staying on track over the coming months. I recommend that you establish a simple monthly check-in system for the rest of the year. It doesn't have to be elaborate. Even 30 minutes at the end of each month can make a huge difference. I suggest that you block time on your calendar at the end of the one month or at the very beginning of the next to do an assessment of your progress. I'll give you a few questions you could ask here. Just block that time on your calendar and then take that 20 or 30 minutes just to do some writing, revisit the notes that you have taken down now, and look at, on a monthly basis how you're making progress towards your goals.

In those monthly check-ins, I invite you to ask yourself these questions. Am I making progress on my primary focus areas? How am I doing in terms of impact, profit, and the feeling of pleasure in my business? What adjustments might serve me in the coming month?

The key to this is to approach these check-ins with curiosity rather than judgment. You're not evaluating whether you're good or bad, successful or unsuccessful. You're simply gathering information that helps you make wise decisions going forward.

As we wrap up today's Mid-Year Check-In, I want to highlight a few key takeaways. First, remember that building a soul-aligned and sustainable business is a practice, not a destination. Every time you take a step back to assess and recalibrate, you're strengthening your ability to create work that serves both your mission and your wellbeing. 

Second, small course corrections are often way more powerful than dramatic overhauls. Most of the time, you don't need to burn everything down and start over. Sometimes the most powerful change is simply deciding to do a little bit more of what's working and a little bit less of what's not.

Third, pleasure isn't a luxury in business. It's essential for sustainability. If you're not experiencing some level of joy, satisfaction, and energy in your work, you're probably not going to be able to sustain it for the long term. And we need you to sustain it because the world needs the impact that you're here to create.

So here's your action step for the week. Take what you've reflected on today and choose one specific area where you want to create more alignment between impact, profit, and pleasure. Maybe it's adjusting your pricing to reflect your value better. Maybe it's saying no to a type of project that drains your energy. Or maybe it’s finally investing in the support that you've been wanting to bring to your team. Whatever it is, make it concrete and take one step forward this week.

Before we close, I want to remind you of something I hope you'll carry with you, not just through the remainder of the year, but through your entire entrepreneurial journey. You don’t have to choose between making money and making a difference. You don't have to sacrifice your wellbeing for your success. And you don't have to wait until you've made it to experience joy in your work. The satisfaction strategy isn't about achieving some perfect balance. It's about creating an ongoing integration of what matters most to you. It's about building something sustainable that serves not just your bottom line, but your soul.

If you like support with strategic planning, with monthly accountability, and to be in a network of like-minded entrepreneurs who are building soul-aligned businesses, I'd love to invite you to check out The Prosper Network.

As the Director of Strategic Visioning for the group, I lead quarterly planning sessions that are included at no cost for our members. For me, the most important thing is that it feels like such a gift to be part of a community where accomplished women entrepreneurs truly support each other's growth. If you want to know more, you can learn all about it at rachelanzalone.com/prosper.

Thank you so much for listening and for taking the time to reflect on the first half of this year and to prepare for what's to come in the second half as well. Until next time, remember, your pleasure is your power. Take care.